


Forever

by Frangipanidownunder



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-23
Updated: 2017-08-23
Packaged: 2018-12-19 00:29:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11886108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Frangipanidownunder/pseuds/Frangipanidownunder
Summary: Prompt: sweet, angsty MSR based on a photo of a wisteria





	Forever

The house chose them. It was a doer-upper, a long-term project, in need of tender love and care. The real estate agent said these things and looked at them and a flicker of a smile crossed her lips like she was telling herself a familiar in-joke. If Scully hadn’t truly believed she needed a renovation after all those months on the run she would have turned on her heel and dragged Mulder with her. But they needed that house as much as it needed them. It was unremarkable in every sense. And it was perfect.  
For the first few weeks they just stayed inside and learned about the creaks and the draughts and the cracks in the ceiling. They learned about each other, in the kitchen and the living room and bedroom, tracing their scars and their tears and unburdening themselves with sobbing or fury or silence. The house stayed still and quiet as they adjusted. And then spring burst forth and everything thawed and everything grew. She chanced applying for a job. He visited the hardware store and stocked up on garden tools and seeds.  
“I got the job, Mulder,” she said, finding him in the yard, raking fresh soil. The organic aroma of fertiliser filled her nostrils and she looked out at the progress he’d made. The muscles in his arms flexed as he worked, his stomach was leaner under his tee-shirt, he was defined again after months of softening invisibility.  
He looked up and smiled. “That’s good, Scully. I know how much this means to you.”  
“It’ll mean more studying.”  
He leant on his rake and nodded. “You can do it.”  
She picked up a black pot and read the label. “Wisteria frutescens. Needs full sun. This will look beautiful over the arbor, Mulder.”  
“Give it a few years, Scully. And it’ll be like it’s always been here.”  
She closed the trunk and sat in the driver’s seat. Mulder was behind the fly-screen door, head leaning against the jamb, hands in pockets. This time, he wasn’t even going to stop her. As she drove away, she saw the wisteria was just a bare-boned skeleton stretched out over the silvered wooden structure that held it up.  
Everything was stripped back and empty. Everything was cold.  
Mulder swore he heard trumpets but she just heard sweet birdsong and hope. She held his hand and they walked back to the house. The creak in the porch steps sung out, the fly-wire door crooned as it opened, welcoming her back. The sounds of the house called to her, the kitchen, the living room, the bedroom. They traced their scars, a few more of them now, they shed more tears and they unburdened themselves with quiet whispering.  
When she left, with a promise to return, Mulder stood on the porch and smiled. The wisteria was in full bloom, spreading its purple flowers across the arbor like it had been there forever.


End file.
